At Thursday night’s meeting of the Trigg County Board of Education, Trigg County School Superintendent Tim McGinnis expressed his anger about comments that were recently made by Kentucky Speaker of the House Greg Stumbo.

McGinnis told board members that Stumbo had stated that legislators might need to take money from the contingency funds of local school boards in order to balance the state’s budget.

The superintendent said he is “proud” that the district continues to make academic gains while it is at the same time pursuing fiscally conservative budget strategies, and added that he has even sent Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear a letter expressing his anger about Stumbo’s idea.

“We don’t drive the fancy vehicles, we’re just very conservative. We buy used vehicles,” said McGinnis.

The superintendent said that although he sent the governor a letter about the issue, he didn’t appreciate that the governor was “on the fence” about it.

McGinnis talked about the community’s support for the school district and said that he is working to show the state that the district’s contingency fund, set at about $2 million, is local revenue and isn’t for the state.

The school district will also spend more than $49,000 to purchase roof-coating materials to re-seal the roof on the Trigg County School Cafeteria and other structures, which will hopefully last for another 10 years, the board unanimously.

The exact cost of the materials through the federal government’s U.S. General Services Administration is $49,509.90, McGinnis said.

Matt Ladd of the school system said that to actually replace one or more of the roofs would be much more expensive, at $290,000. He also said the school should use Garland Roofing Systems materials.

“That roof is starting to show some wear,” Ladd said. “The integrity of the insulation and the decking is still really good.”

The warranty for the roofs of the cafeteria, field house, small storage building and elementary school ramp will be good for another 10 years, said McGinnis, who added that school staff will be tasked with the work and JKS Architects will provide technical support.

McGinnis said they will be want a 20-year warranty next time a roof needs to be replaced, since the last time a roof was replaced roughly 10 years ago, it had a 10-year warranty.

In other action, board members unanimously approved a Memorandum of Agreement with Marshall County Schools to contract a teacher of the deaf and hard of hearing for 180 minutes a day and two times a week for 34 weeks, at a cost of about $11,000.

The 180 minutes includes 90 minutes to and from Trigg County Schools and Marshall County Schools and 90 minutes for the services, said McGinnis, who added that the teacher will still be employed by Marshall County Schools.

The rest of the week, deaf and hard of hearing students have in-class interpreters, said Travis Hamby, Trigg County Schools assistant superintendent of operations.

In other business, the board recognized Andrea Hampton, Anita Lane and Diane Hampton of Trigg County Adult Education for their hard work. Andrea Hampton said they have been busier since Johnson Controls closed.

Last Tuesday night, the board met with the various site-based councils to talk about the district’s test scores for this year as well as the general upward trend in those test scores over the past 10 years.

The meeting started with dinner at the Trigg County Schools Cafeteria. On the placemats were the numbers “02/20,” referencing that in regard to the KCCT, Trigg County Schools this year are second in the region and 20th in the state as a whole.

“You all have done some great work,”McGinnis said.

For the school to be ranked where it is would have been seen as unlikely so many years ago, McGinnis said.

“We’re glad to be here,” said Mike Davis, Trigg County Board of Education chairman.

The group then moved to the Trigg County Elementary School Library, where they discussed test scores and how much they have improved in the past 10 years for more than two hours.

McGinnis said that many years ago, he “realized we really didn’t know the components of NCLB (No Child Left Behind).”